A thin disk laser, sometimes referred to as an “active mirror,” is an optical amplifier gain medium, typically but not necessarily disk-shaped, in which stimulated emission of light, i.e., “lasing,” is produced when a pump laser illuminates the disk, resulting in gain in emitted light. Conventional thin-disk lasers may be made from ytterbium (Yb) doped yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG) disks bonded to heat sinks or heat spreaders, such as diamond or copper. In conventional thin disk laser systems, the crystal of the gain medium, which may have an anti-reflection (AR) coating on the front side thereof that is effective at both the incident pump and emitted laser radiation wavelengths, is fixed to the heat sink/spreader with a layer of indium or equivalent bonding solder or adhesive. The heat sink may be liquid cooled (e.g., with water), or by use of a thermoelectric (TE) cooler, from the back side.
The significant difference in the respective coefficients of thermal expansion (CTE) values of the heat sink and the disk laser prevents device scaling to larger diameters for operation at increased power output. In particular, if the bonding operation occurs at room temperature or above, larger devices are limited to operation at close to the assembly temperature to prevent catastrophic failure.
More particularly, conventional thin disk lasers typically operate at room temperature, which is usually the same temperature at which the thin disk laser system (comprising, for example, a diamond heat sink, adhesive and Yb:YAG gain medium:host material) is assembled, and at reduced power levels, so that CTE issues are neither confronted nor resolved. Conventional designs may also incorporate an outer region of the disk that is not pumped to aid in disk integrity, and support heat dissipation requirements. However, as the disk is operated at increasing power output levels, sufficient temperature differences can occur across the disk area, as well as the interfacial bonding region between the disk and the heat spreader, to cause catastrophic failure due to the differences in the respective material CTE's.
Additionally, it is known that the efficiency and performance of such devices improve as their operating temperature is lowered, for example, to cryogenic temperatures. However, the difference between CTE's of the disk and heat spreader may again lead to failure upon cooling below the assembly temperature. The foregoing CTE issues thus severely limit scaling of the device size to produce higher output powers. In addition, the resulting thermally induced stresses may introduce undesirable aberration in the output beam by distorting the laser crystal optically, and otherwise degrade the quality or brightness of the laser light produced.
In light of the foregoing, there is a need for thin disk laser design and assembly methods that eliminate or reduce the CTE mismatch problem to enable device scaling for higher output.